Last month, nearly one Philadelphia driver per day found themselves racing toward a Philadelphia emergency room with a shooting victim in their car. At the Gun Crisis Reporting Project, we covered reports of 97 people wounded or killed by gunfire during July, 2014 in Philadelphia, based original reporting, media reports, police officials and other sources.

Private vehicles arrived at local hospitals with 29 people suffering gunshot wounds throughout last month, and five more victims walked in unescorted. Police officers rushed 44 shooting victims to city hospitals last month and fire department medics transported 17 more. Medics also pronounced two shooting victims dead on location.

Private vehicles brought 29 shooting victims to city hospitals, and five more walked into emergency departments, which when combined represent more than 35 percent of the total victims reported during July. Click to view larger chart.

A Penn Medicine study released earlier this year found similar survival rates for gunshot and stabbing victims whether brought to the hospital by police or emergency medical services, but did not discuss victims who arrived on their own. The study also found that severely injured gunshot victims transported by police were more likely to survive, possibly due to shorter response times. A following Philadelphia Inquirer report found support from a police official, a firefighters representative and an emergency room physician.

In 2012, the Inquirer reported that the practice was also in effect in other cities, including Chicago and New York City, but Philadelphia may be the only city with formal guidelines for officers. The police “scoop and run” police was first adopted in Philadelphia more than 20 years ago, according to WHYY.

At top of page: A police officer searches for evidence at the scene of a shooting last month on Berks Street near 28th Street in North Philadelphia. A 26-year-old man arrived in a private vehicle at Temple University with leg wounds and was listed in stable condition. Photograph for the Gun Crisis Reporting Project by Joseph Kaczmarek.

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